Surrendering To Her Sergeant (30 page)

Thank God he looked like he
didn’t know whether to grin or puke from all of it.
Welcome to the club, Sergeant Archer.

“Avvvvaaaa!”

Bella’s interruption to her brood was
a shock. She’d only diverted her eyes for a second, captivated by
the last rays of the sunset over the waves, apparently one second
longer than allowed.

“Shit,” she muttered.
“
Shit
.” The repeat
happened when it was clear that Ethan was right on the woman’s
heels. And that was surprising…why? The two had been the giggling,
flirting golden couple on the set for four days. As thoroughly as
Ava had fought to ignore the development, the rest of the world
hadn’t. The web leaks had likely made it to neighboring galaxies by
now. Tonight’s event was clearly doubling as their coming-out
soiree.

Bella herself sealed the deal on that
speculation, as well as Ava’s heartache, by insisting Ava dig out a
cocktail dress and shadow her with the styling bag for the night.
Unless Ava came down with the plague, absence wasn’t an option. It
wasn’t like she didn’t know the drill, having been tagged as the
woman’s glamour secret service before. She was to be out of sight
and out of mind unless there was a hair, makeup, or dress disaster
that needed life-saving intervention. Apparently, one of those
emergencies had struck.

As Bella paced closer, she
performed a fast visual to try and spot the calamity. Her
assessment yielded nothing out of place, but that didn’t mean
anything. Bella didn’t give her any clue, gliding closer without a
waver of her smile or champagne flute. That also didn’t warrant
surprise. The woman had once given a flawless interview to
Entertainment Tonight
on
the red carpet as Ava crouched at her feet resewing two inches of
hem that’d been ripped during the limo exit.

She forced her face into composure,
ready for anything. Not an easy feat, considering Ethan looked even
better up close. His dress jacket, which brought out the layers of
cobalt in his eyes, was pressed and perfectly fitted on his wide
shoulders. He’d also been treated to a manicure and professional
shave, then dunked in something that smelled wonderful on him.
Damn. No wonder half the women out here risked Bella’s backlash by
giving him lingering gawks. No wonder every cell in her body burst
open in new awareness—followed by livid castigation.

Maybe this all happened
for the best, Ethan.

She still believed that.
She
had
to believe
that. Her throat convulsed on the painful swallow she forced as
affirmation. Not that simply looking at them couldn’t accomplish
the same thing. They were the most perfect couple on a patio filled
with perfection. The noble soldier and the breathtaking starlet.
She had no doubt that half the producers in the room were already
scheming ways to develop their story for the screen.

Mierda
. Why was it suddenly so hard to breathe?

Thank God Bella didn’t share the
challenge. “Oh, Ava, Ava, Ava,” the woman chirped. “Ethan needs
you.”

Seemed that shock therapy came in
handy as a good warm-up. The thousand volts that hit her now were a
little easier to handle, especially as she looked to Ethan for
confirmation. His gorgeous face was etched in a mix of bewilderment
and embarrassment that made her heart pinch until her brain
retaliated. She couldn’t forget he’d asked for this bed as much as
she—for the last four days, to be exact. If he was uncomfortable,
maybe he should’ve researched the linens a little
better.

“What’s the problem?” she asked as
diplomatically as she could.

Bella giggled. It was the laugh she
got after refusing to eat all day, resulting in half a glass of
champagne flying straight to her head. “Me,” she said, snickering
again. “I’m the problem!” She wiggled her fingers in the air.
“Oopsie!”

Ava deliberately swung her gaze out to
the beach again. There were times when reacting to Bella’s “humor”
in any fashion wasn’t a good idea. She wasn’t sure if the woman was
feigning the frivolity or if the bubbly was hitting her that
hard.

A huff came from Ethan’s direction.
When she looked up, his irritated glare was tough to miss, even
past the tumble of his hair. “Bella,” he muttered, dragging the
stuff backward with one hand, “honestly, this isn’t—”

“No
!” Ava’s reflexes weren’t clouded so she was able to get the
protest out faster than Bella. She was also able to step to the
man, grab his wrist and wrench it down before he could wreak any
more damage to the ’do. As he glowered, she charged, “Stop. Now.
Fingers don’t go near the head again tonight. That
is
an order,
Sergeant.”

“Amen, sister!”

She couldn’t help chuckling at Bella’s
tipsy vote of support. Her mirth seemed to calm Ethan, too. “All
right, all right,” he muttered. “This isn’t a fight I’m going to
win. Torture me, Mistress Ava, but don’t expect me to give up state
secrets.”

Ava rolled her eyes while searching
for a discreet alcove. The idea of having her hands in his hair
both thrilled and gutted her, meaning she wasn’t totally opposed to
the sudden appearance of Enzo Lemare.

“Sister?” the man
questioned in his rich Italian accent. He strolled up in a
luxurious double-breasted tux, probably Armani or D&G, that was
impeccably tailored for his elegant build. “
Davvero
?” He directed his attention,
full of smoldering green eyes and smooth hands, right at her. “Why
did I not see the resemblance before? It is clear to me now. What a
clever move, Bella, to hire your stunning sister as your stylist.
Who better to know the family secrets and keep them that way,
yes?”

Ava threw back an indulgent smile.
“Thank you for the lovely compliment, Mr. Lemare, but I’m
not—”

“Stunning?” Bella looked as puzzled by
the statement as she did her empty champagne glass. “Sister? Oh,
Enzo, you and that language barrier. Darling, I meant—”

“To have me take you inside.” Ethan
saved her from the embarrassing blurt by smoothly grabbing her
waist, making sure the booze didn’t deliver Bella face first into
the concrete. “It’s getting chilly out here. Your wrap is already
at the table.”

“Awww.” Bella crooned it with adoring
eyes while stroking his jaw with a finger. “You take such good care
of me.”

Ava could’ve sworn Ethan’s whole body
tensed at that but wrote the perception off to her own reaction,
unplugging the electroshock in favor of old-fashioned nausea. But
the moment she thought they’d finally leave, giving her five
minutes to grab some water with a Pepto-Bismol chaser, their
offside soiree turned into a full attention-getter. Bella’s caress
on Ethan’s cheek was captured by a blinding photographer’s flash.
When Bella herself winced at the intrusion, Enzo stepped forward
again.

“Mie
scuse
,
cara
.” The spread his hands. “I was
so busy basking in your sister’s beauty, I neglected to tell you I
brought a friend.”

Protesting the man’s error seemed
fruitless right now, especially when someone laughed at Lemare from
the darkness beyond the flash. “Friend? That’s debatable at the
moment. Put your wizzler back in your pants, Enzo, before you get
me killed. You told me Miss Lanza would be on the arm of an Army
man, not a bloody demigod.”

Ava forgot about wanting to puke. For
a long moment, she wasn’t even cognizant of her stomach. A fast
peek at Bella corroborated her awe. That cosmopolitan mix of
accents, delivered in that unmistakable mix of snark, swagger, and
sex, only belonged to one man on earth. She gasped his name at
Bella now. “Grant Fulsom?”

“Mio
Dio
, Ava,” she replied. “I think
so.”

Sure enough, the iconic photographer
himself strolled up in a wrinkled polo shirt and khakis, his
angular face weathered from years of capturing superstars
everywhere from Athens to Montserrat to Zimbabwe. In the world of
celebrity, being immortalized by Fulsom was one of the rites of
passage into superstardom. It was one of the things on the “big
list” to cross off. Memoir. Fragrance. Shoe line. White House
visit. Grant Fulsom photo shoot.

“Mr. Fulsom.” Bella’s voice actually
shook. Ava watched Ethan’s arm tighten around her waist in silent
reinforcement. “It’s—what an honor to—”

Fulsom chopped her short by swooping
her hand to his lips. He followed with a vigorous laugh. “By God,
Enzo, you’re right. She’s an enchanting dish.” The man wheeled an
equally suggestive appraisal toward Ethan. “And so is
he.”

Ethan barely moved, though
his growl sounded like a living beast on the air. “Kiss my hand
and
your
wizzler
is dust, assface.”

“Ooohhh.” Fulsom’s dark green eyes
went wide. “Yes, sir!”

Mr. Lemare chuckled and
backhanded Fulsom’s shoulder. “Down,
amico
. You’ll need plenty of energy
in the days to come.”

“Oh?” Bella flashed her most
charismatic smile. “Are you in town to shoot someone
big?”

Ethan glowered at her then the men.
“What the hell?”

Lemare let out his own booming laugh
at that. “She means a photography shoot, Ethan. How do they say it
in your unit? It is all right to…stand down?”

“Not for too long,” Fulsom asserted,
still giving Ethan a workup with his gaze. “He’s bloody fine in the
standing position, too.”

While Ethan fumed and Bella threw
Lemare a probing gaze, Ava kept an eye on Fulsom. She was pretty
certain what he was thinking. She looked at Bella in the same way
all the time, projecting elements like skin tone, hairstyle, eye
brightness, and facial features into the future, to determine how
certain lighting was going to affect the look of each. By the time
a full minute had passed, she could nearly predict what Lemare was
about to say to his show’s leading lady.

“He is in town as a favor
to me, Bella.” Enzo grinned like a dad about to tell his kids they
were skipping school to go to the fair all day. “I think our live
broadcast would be well-served with some of Grant’s photos to
accompany it.” When Bella gave that just a tiny smile of hope, he
went on, “Photos of you,
cara
—with one of our fine soldier
advisors as your strapping alpha hero.” He nodded at Ethan in
conclusion to that.

Bella squealed.

Ethan paled.

“Okay, whoa,” he mumbled.
“Bella—oof!” He stumbled back a step as she threw herself into his
arms. “Wait.
Wait.
” He glared back through her hair. “Look, Mr.
Lemare—”

“Enzo.” The man held out placating
arms. “I already told you, Sergeant, you must start calling me
Enzo.”

“Great. Enzo. Look,
I’m
not
a
model.”

“Now you are.” Bella kissed his cheek
long enough to leave an imprint that was only going to come out via
remover wipe. “This is going to be wildly fun, Ethan! You’ll
see.”

He set her back, his eyes
getting darker. “The only thing I’m supposed to be ‘seeing’ are the
scripts, the set, and the route back to my hotel. Bella, we had to
jump through a bunch of hoops just for Rhett and I to come
to
this
thing. A
damn photo shoot—”

“Has already been approved by your
captain and his chain of command,” Lemare filled in.

Ethan’s lips twisted. “Yeah,” he said,
“I’ll bet.”

“And there will be plenty of us there
from the show’s production staff, myself included, to make sure you
two behave…most of the time.”

That drew another delighted giggle out
of Bella. Ava studied her for a long moment. When the woman was
truly happy, not just putting it on for paparazzi or acting it for
the camera, the emotion transformed her from beautiful to
breathtaking. She’d tried to make Bella see that but the starlet
was one of those stunning women who’d been told, somewhere in those
important years of their girlhood, that they were ugly and always
would be. Ava had met many such girls during the weekly beauty
class she volunteered with through the inner-city church
cooperative. Maybe, with the love of a good man or thousands of
dollars in therapy, the star would comprehend her true worth one
day—but right now, Ava was certain that Ethan’s psyche was going to
be her bigger concern.

The conclusion plummeted
her gaze to the ground in self-beratement.
Mierda
. She’d tell herself not to
take one more step down that path…if she wasn’t already on it. If
she didn’t know, from the core of her spirit, that she was really
concerned about how this bizarre turn of events would affect Ethan.
During those two days in Seattle for Garrett and Sage’s wedding,
she’d seen why he wasn’t the guy with the shrimp tails on his
fingers. He’d grown up in a world where appearances were everything
yet had given him nothing, leading him to take a leap of faith and
dedicate himself to a job where nothing mattered but his mind and
his mettle. Now he was being ordered to go let one of the world’s
biggest image makers capitalize on the one thing for which he never
wanted to be seen.